1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image display method and apparatus for displaying images (e.g. motion pictures) corresponding to voice data or document data, and more particularly, to an image display method and apparatus capable of displaying sign language images corresponding to speech.
2. Description of the Related Art
The addition of voice data (such as a voice, music and the like) to video images has been long performed, and an apparatus which not only reproduces video images but generates sounds related to the images is well known.
However, there has been provided no apparatus which generates and displays images corresponding to input document data, voice signals and the like. For example, the contents of a television program are, as is well known, given to deaf persons by superimposing a caption on the screen or displaying the contents of speech in sign language on a part of the screen. However, since such caption and sign language displays incur much trouble and cost in editing, they are, as matters now stand, difficult to carry out.
Furthermore, the provision of information in characters, such as a caption, requires the deaf persons to make efforts toward understanding the information and to concentrate their attention on reading the characters.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an image display method and apparatus capable of displaying images corresponding to document data or voice data.
In order to achieve the above object, according to one aspect of the present invention, there is provided an image display apparatus comprising image storage means for storing image data, storage means for storing document data, readout means for reading out document data stored in the storage means and reading out image data corresponding to a character string of the document data from the image storage means, and display means for displaying the image data read out by the readout means.
The above structure makes it possible to display images corresponding to document data.
Since document data is displayed in a character pattern together with image data, the character pattern and the image data can be ascertained in correspondence.
Since image data to be displayed may be sign language image data corresponding to a word or a phrase, an easily recognizable image can be provided.
Since image data to be displayed may be a motion picture, an easily recognizable image can be provided.
The addition of an expansion means for expanding image data allows display image data to be stored under compression, thereby taking less memory.
According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided an image display apparatus comprising image storage means for storing image data, speech input means for inputting speech therefrom, speech recognizing means for recognizing the speech inputted from the speech input means and generating a character code string corresponding to the recognized speech, readout means for reading out image data corresponding to the character code string from the image storage means, and display means for displaying the image data read out by the readout means.
Therefore, it is possible to generate images corresponding to speech.
According to still another aspect of the present invention, there is provided an image display method comprising the steps of inputting speech and recognizing the speech, and displaying an image corresponding to the speech based on the result of the speech recognition.
Therefore, it is possible to display images corresponding to speech.
Steps may be added for inputting a video signal together with speech, and compositely displaying an image corresponding to the video signal and the image corresponding to the recognized speech.
Other objects and features of the present invention will become clear upon reading the following description.